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21 February 2011

Screwed Over by Wargames Factory

My own bit of fuel to the fire that has been the Wargames Factory Takeover of Doom... I've generally kept quiet on everything until now. But at this point, it seems that it can't hurt. And I'm pissed off.

I did some painting commissions for Wargames Factory in November & December. Just a few units of (so far) unreleased figures, for their use on packaging and web/promotional materials. They were delivered to WF the first weeks of December and January. After re-submitting all of the documentation requested (invoices, shipping receipts, emails, etc. including my photos of the work) there was a long period of silence during which I sent occasional emails asking for an update on the status of my payment, I have now been told that they won't be paying me because the new manager does not have possession of the figures, and it has been recommended that I privately contact a former employee to try to get payment from them.

I painted for Wargames Factory, not for my contact person at the company. I honored my end of the agreement with WF, my work was delivered. After that the fact that their staff changed, and that somewhere in their apparently rough transition the work has not made it into the possession of the current staff, is not my problem nor does it negate our agreement.

So you can add me to the list of people who have been screwed over by Wargames Factory and their Takeover of Doom. Based on this experience I will (obviously) not work with them again. I recommend against anyone else working with them as well. Hell, at this point I'm done buying their product and encourage others to shop elsewhere too.

If all of this somehow gets resolved I'll post an update.

Here's an article I saw posted elsewhere that seems to piece together what has gone down at Wargames Factory:

10 comments:

Wargames Factory has basically committed suicide. One, the figures where never that good, (I have a ton of the them) the company succeeded namely on the passion and enthusiasm of Tony Reidy. Two, the community and sales base is too small to survive this amount of bad press. People generally dont forget.

The ancients stuff seemed to be much better quality in the end but as it was pointed out to me by several WAB vets..oldtimers dont want to be fiddling with plastic bits.I pretty much agree. Despite the problems at the product level Tony held the whole thing together making people overlook the shortcomings.

I think the Chinese and this Lonnie fellow saw dollar signs with the Shock Troops and made their play. Again Shock Troops might work as IG conversions but its not a quality box in terms of competing with GW 40K sales that's going to have any lasting impactlike some of the EU resin parts makers.

I'm going to guess they close up shop as soon as inventory reaches the point were lack of new orders doesnt meet monthly expenses..when ever that is, this year, next year. Wargames Factory will be example of how not to run your miniatures company..I do hope Tony makes a come back.

I've kept my mouth shut on this topic for a few months now, hoping it would work out. But it hasn't.

As far as the rest of the issues surrounding the company, I'm still going to keep my opinions & observations to myself, other than to say that not only have they've lost me as a supporter.

I informally promoted their products by posting photos of my painting around the web, and have been using them (and talking about them a lot when people ask about the figures) at conventions and other events.

I thought you should know (if you don't already) that the back cover of Ancient Warfare vol IV issue 6 is a full page ad for Wargames Factory WSS figs. And the ad uses three pictures of miniatures they credit you with painting. Just wanted to let you know WF is using images of your painting to sell their stuff.

Thanks. I painted a couple of the early test castings of the WSS figures as a "sample" for them to see what they would be getting if they started commissioning me. So that's all OK.

As far as the rest, it seems that we are close to an agreement to resolve the issue, but I didn't want to say anything until it's finalized. But hopefully by next week I will be able to announce that we've worked things out.